


Birthdays and surgeries

by aron_kristina



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Ankh-Morpork, Birthday, F/M, Gen, Igors doing Igor things, Romance, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-19
Updated: 2014-12-19
Packaged: 2018-03-02 06:42:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2803220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aron_kristina/pseuds/aron_kristina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Preston has his birthday, Tiffany finds someone who needs help and Igors do strange things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Birthdays and surgeries

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bliumchik](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bliumchik/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! I hope you like this. I took your idea of Igors doing sex reassignment surgery and then it kind of ran with me :)
> 
> Many thanks as always to my lovely beta who shall remain nameless for now.
> 
> Comments, corrections and concrit always welcome

If nothing else, being an apprentice meant that Preston didn't have time for a lot of other things, like eating proper food, sleeping for a full night, and worrying about Tiffany.1 He was learning a lot of things, and he had finally gotten to start taking care of patients for real, talking to them about their problems, examinations and trying to make them better, so he didn't have time to worry about things like birthdays2 He especially didn't have time to anticipate having the evening off because Tiffany was coming to visit.3

He was standing around scrubbing some bedpans, a task he didn't strictly have to do but which gave him something to do with his hands, when a young nurse apprentice came up to him.

”Doctor Preston, there's someone looking for you,” she said, and took the brush out of his hands.

”I'm not a doctor yet, Mary, Should I go to the entrance?” he asked.

”Yes, at the free coffee in the corner, doctor Preston,” Mary said, with a teasing tone.

”Thank you,” Preston said, going to the wash basin for hands (clearly marked for the purpose) and washed carefully. It didn't do to meet visitors of any sort with dirty hands. Especially not visitors who were keen on hygiene. As he walked down the stairs his grin got wider and wider until he reached the entrance hall, where it slowly fell.

Tiffany was standing by the old coffee pot that Preston didn't understand how anyone would want to drink out of, wearing her best black dress and carrying a big bag, but she wasn't alone. With her was a person, shivering and looking on the verge of tears, whom Tiffany had her arms around. When Preston came closer he saw that it looked like a young girl, but she was very thin and had a boy's haircut, so it was difficult to determine age.

”Preston, this is Jan,” Tiffany said, without even saying hello. ”He needs help.”

”He...?” Preston said without thinking, and Jan started to cry.

“Wait here,” Preston said, and walked quickly over to the reception desks. There was a woman standing behind the closest unoccupied one who Preston vaguely remembered being called Elisa. Or Erin. Or perhaps Erica.

“Do you have a free room somewhere?” he asked her.

“What for?” Esther demanded, with a rather stern voice.

“I have a patient. It's urgent,” he told her with a glance back at Tiffany and Jan. She followed his gaze and her face softened somewhat.

“I'll see what I can do,” Elsa said. She took out a large red ledger and started looking through it.

“The Liver Room is free, though Igor might be sleeping in it,” she said after a minute.

“Is there nothing else?” Preston said, trying not to grimace.

“No,” Edith said.

“Ok, thank you,” he said, trying not to sigh. The Liver Room was his least favourite of all the operating theatres. He walked back to Tiffany and Jan and beckoned them to follow him. On the way he tried to prepare them for The Liver Room, but there really was no preparing someone for something like that.

***

The walls were liver coloured4, painted with some kind of special paint that could be scrubbed without going all bubbly, and the floor was best not mentioned. In the middle stood an operating table, and on one wall were jars full of livers floating around in various liquids. Most were in the normal clear liquid the Igors used for livers, but the Igors of the hospital were the extra experimental kind, so several were in greenish and bluish liquids, as well as one that looked like it lay in blood. At least it was clean, and only smelled of liver and the strange stuff the cleaning staff used, instead of stinking of liver, blood and the various other things that could come out of a human body. Tiffany held her hand over her mouth and Jan was trying not to gag.

“Sorry,” said Preston. “You get used to it after a while. Take a seat.” He gestured to the table, the only available seat in the room. Tiffany inspected the table, presumably to see if it was clean, and after a while she sat down gingerly. Jan sat next to her and held on to her arm. Preston remained standing.

“Can you tell me what you need help with?” Preston asked. This was one of the Five Questions that you needed to ask a patient.5

“I heard that there was this new operation the Igors did,” Jan said. “To, to change, you know.” Jan blushed, and looked down at the floor.

“Igors change things a lot,” Preston said carefully.

“To change down there,” Jan said, looking slightly ill. Preston couldn't decide if this was because of the subject matter or because of the liver smell.

“Preston, can I talk to you alone for a moment,” Tiffany said suddenly and stood up from the table. She took Preston's hand and led him to a corner without any jars.

“You know that operation you told me about that the Igors do in secret,” Tiffany said.

“The one I didn't at all tell you about, you mean?” Preston asked.

“I'm a witch, I'd have found out sooner or later anyway,” Tiffany said. She still held his hand and Preston found it a bit difficult to argue that he hadn't told her so much as she had guessed, inferred and confronted him about the operation. Strictly speaking, Preston wasn't supposed to know about it either. The Igors kept it quiet for reasons of their own, but if Preston had to guess it was because of people, and religion. A lot of things were.

“Yes, well...” he started. “I can't do it. What, I mean, which...” He felt himself blushing and looked back at Jan.

“Jan is a boy. Just not, you know, a boy,” Tiffany said.

“Oh,” Preston said. He looked back again, and Jan was fidgeting on the table.

“Okay,” he said. “Let's go look for Igor.”

“Which Igor?” Tiffany asked. “Any Igor,” Preston answered.7

They found an Igor who soon understood the problem, probably understood it better than Preston himself did, and Jan was whisked away to the basement, looking slightly alarmed, even after Tiffany had reassured him that everything was going to be fine and she'd be waiting when they were done. Preston told the other Igor that they could be found in his room, and led Tiffany by the hand there. He wanted to hold her, but he felt unsure in the wake of everything that had happened. As soon as they reached his room Tiffany leaned against his chest and held onto him, and he held her back. After a while he realized she was crying, but by then she had nearly stopped, and when she stepped back from him she smiled slightly as she dried her tears.

“It had to be done,” she said, and in that moment she was so beautiful to him, travel weary, tear streaked.

“What have you been up to?” he asked her, and guided her to his bed.

“Oh, this and that. You know how it is,” she said. “Old Thatcher's leg has been acting up again, and Roland needed help with a feud over some land, the usual stuff. How about you?”

“Work, mostly. How did you find Jan?”

“Oh, he was standing around outside and didn't dare go in, because he didn't know who to ask for. He was brought up strictly Omnian, you know,” Tiffany said.

“I thought Omnians didn't do that kind of thing anymore,”8 Preston said, slightly bewildered but accepting that Tiffany knew what she was doing. Mostly.

“They don't, mostly. It's more of a sect I think,” Tiffany said. “We talked for a bit and then I convinced him that I knew someone who could help.”

“The Igors are very good,” Preston agreed.

“I meant you,” Tiffany said.

“Oh.” Tiffany seemed to remember something. She started rooting in her bag and after a while she held up a parcel that looked a bit worse for wear.

“Happy Birthday,” she said, pressing it into his hand.

“Thank you,” he said and took it from her. Inside was a small wooden box, and when he opened it it contained a bit of earth with a tuft of wool on top. He looked at Tiffany who was blushing.

“I didn't know what to give you, and you said you missed home, so I brought a bit of it with me,” she said, not looking at him. He couldn't say anything, just put his arms around her and held her. After a bit he cleared his throat.

“Thank you,” he said, and kissed the crown of her head.

***

They sat in silence for a while before there was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” Preston called. Mary stepped into the room.

“Igor asked you to come to the green room,” she said.

“We'll be right there,” Preston said.

“The green room?” Tiffany asked. “I thought all the rooms were named after their purpose.”

“The purpose of the green room is supposed to be secret, remember?” Preston said. “Anyway, it _is_ green.”

They went down into the basement, which was far less gloomy than Tiffany had expected. There were oil lamps on the walls and all in all it looked rather nice. They were met outside the door by Igor.

“The patient ith doing jutht fine, mithth” he said. “A bit more retht and he'll be right ath rain. It wath good that you brought him in, he wath in a bit of a bad thtate, mentally.”

“What did you do to him?” Tiffany asked.

“Oh, we had thome thtpareth tho we gave him one of thothe, and of courthe we altho removed thome thingth he didn't want,” Igor said, and Preston was glad he didn't go into more detail. What the Igors did was really neat, but he didn't think Tiffany needed to hear it in detail.

“He wath athleep during the prothedure of courthe. Would you like to thee him?”

“Yes, please,” said Tiffany.

They all went into the room which was indeed green. Jan was lying on a slab, looking a bit groggy.

“Hi,” Tiffany said, slipping into what Preston thought of as her 'cheery bedside manner'.“How do you feel?”

“Tired,” Jan said, and Preston noted that his voice was a bit deeper too. He looked at Tiffany and she had noted it too. “But good.”

“That's nice. What are you going to do now?” she asked.

“Igor said I could stay for a bit. Then I'll probably try to find work in the city. It seems nice here,” Jan said.

“The patient needth to retht now,” Igor said. “You can come back tomorrow and thee him if you wish.”

Preston and Tiffany said goodbye and left.

“It's getting late,” Preston said.

“I'm sorry we didn't celebrate properly,” Tiffany said.

“Some things are more important than birthdays,” Preston said. “We'll go out for breakfast tomorrow.”

“I should head for Mrs Proust's for the evening,” Tiffany said. Despite this she didn't let go of his hand.

“Yes,” Preston said.

“I'll come back as soon as I've gotten up.”

“That's good.” Tiffany gave him one last look and then she turned around, not letting go of his hand until the last moment. She started walking away, but when she had reached halfway to the door she turned around and came back. She didn't say anything, just reached up to tilt his head down so she could kiss him, then she left again. Preston stood for a while with a quite silly smile on his face9 before he went to his room to sleep. He did have a post-birthday breakfast date after all.

 

1 Actually, that last was a lie. ↩

2 That was a big lie. ↩

3 The biggest lie of all. ↩

4 Preston knew this, he'd seen livers. ↩

5 The others were: “What is your name? Can you use the privy as usual? What did you eat yesterday? What is your favourite colour?6

6 He rarely used this one. ↩

7 After working at the Lady Sibyl Free Hospital for a little over two years he still had difficulty telling them apart, and strictly speaking it didn't matter much anyway. ↩

8 Omnians do a lot of things, and it's never easy, even if you're part of the church, to know exactly what they were doing at any given moment. However, they do try not to torture, burn or otherwise kill or maim people. ↩

9 Though he didn't know this himself ↩


End file.
